Category Archives: Covid-19

COVID-19 hospitalizations in Maine rose to their highest total of the pandemic Saturday, breaking the record set Friday and straining system capacity as hospitals report large numbers of staffare infected with the virus.

Meanwhile, many of those getting vaccinated at a clinic Saturday said they know a growing number of people who have contracted COVID-19.

There were 399 COVID-19 patients in hospitals throughout Maine, the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention reported Saturday, up from 391 Friday.

The previous high before Friday was 387 on Dec. 21. Hospitalizations dipped to 327 on Dec. 26, but have been climbing since. The Maine CDC has said 70 percent of all people hospitalized with COVID-19 are not fully vaccinated.

Of those hospitalized, 106 were in critical care and 57 on ventilators, the state reported Saturday. Both numbers are down from Fridays 110 in critical care and 59 on ventilators. Unlike overall hospitalizations, those totals remained steady and even declined in recent weeks as cases have risen, a likely sign that the omicron variant is causing fewer severe cases.

However, the speed with which omicron is spreading indicates it might be even more contagious than health officials had warned earlier.

Early advice suggesting that infection is most likely after prolonged contact with someone who has the disease is no longer valid, the president of the Maine Medical Association said Saturday.

The trouble with omicron is it spreads real fast, said Dr. Jeffrey Barkin. Omicron spreads as easily as perfume wafting through the air indoors, he said. The omicron variant could be caught just by walking past an infected person indoors, he said.

It could be an elevator ride that is brief but in a contained space, he said. Thats why really good masking to block out those highly infectious virus particles is a good idea if you dont want to get sick.

He recommends N-95 masks, even the medical grade N-95s. The KN-95 masks are good, he said, but make sure the mask fits snugly across the nose creating a protective seal. The better it fits, the better, he said.

Dr. Robert Horsburgh, an epidemiologist at Boston University, said the omicron variant is several orders of magnitude more infectious than experts previously warned. People at high risk, including those who are immune compromised or unvaccinated, need to be super careful now, Horsburgh said.

Experts predict that infections will continue to rise in urban areas with higher population densities, even those that have high vaccination rates.

Thats already happening, said several people who turned out Saturday for a walk-in vaccine clinic at the Goodfire Brewing Co. in Portland hosted by co-owners and husband and wife doctors David and Julia Redding.

Shayla Skinner of Portland, who was getting her booster, said more and more people she knows are contracting COVID-19.

It seems like everyone has it right now. My roommate tested positive, so I went to my parents. We all took the test and were negative. But then her step-sister and mother tested positive, she said.

Skinner said she still has not contracted COVID-19. But everyone I talk to knows at least three people who have tested positive.

Neeley Hunt of Portland, who also got her booster shot at Saturdays clinic, said the omicron variant is spreading quickly among so many in the past month.

Hunt came down with the virus 11 days ago. I had both vaccinations, I also had COVID a year ago.

In her recent bout, the cough was pretty gnarly, Hunt said. I had body aches, fatigue. Shes feeling better now, but is still fatigued.

Both women were thrilled to get a booster at the brewery its still hard to find a booster appointment, Hunt said. And, she added with a grin, Booze and boosters?!

Dr. Barkin had a warning for anyone exposed to the virus who then tests negative with a home test.

You want to repeat the test. Follow the directions on the test for a re-test, because theres a risk of a false negative, he said. If its positive on a home test, or the minute you have symptoms, youve got to quarantine for five days. After that, you have to wear a mask when leaving home, he said.

Barkin said expectations that the vaccine will prevent illness must be recalibrated.

The vaccines do not prevent getting the virus, but what they do very well is if you do get infected, they make it so that your risk of getting really sick or dying goes down a lot, he said.

Whether 25 percent or 75 percent of the population ends up getting COVID-19 is speculative, he said. But it will be a good number. The future is going to be different.

People also need to understand that recommendations from experts today could change in a week or two as case numbers rise and fall, Barkin said.

The more flexible we are, the more easy it will be to adapt to the changes which are already upon us, he said. Weve got to do that together.

The Maine CDC reported 1,203 new cases of COVID-19 on Saturday and four more deaths. Since the pandemic began, there have been 153,376 confirmed or probable cases, and 1,603 deaths in Maine. Both remain among the lowest per capita of any state.

Because state officials are dealing with so many tests, and because many people are taking at-home tests and not reporting the results to the state, the daily case counts from the Maine CDC dont necessarily capture the most current picture. Many of the new cases reported this week have been from positive tests dating back a week or more.

Invalid username/password.

Please check your email to confirm and complete your registration.

Use the form below to reset your password. When you've submitted your account email, we will send an email with a reset code.

Previous

Next

Read more:

COVID-19 hospitalizations in Maine break record for second consecutive day - Press Herald

The city of Newburyport Health Department will be offering free COVID-19 testing clinics at the Newburyport Harbormaster Department located at 278 Water St., per the following schedule:

Monday, Jan. 10, noon 3 p.m.

Tuesday, Jan. 11, noon 3 p.m.

Thursday, Jan. 13, 2 5:30 p.m.

Tuesday, Jan. 18, noon 3 p.m.

Thursday, Jan. 20, 2 5:30 p.m.

The goal of these testing events is to provide free rapid antigen testing to Newburyport residents as the city sees a massive surge in COVID-19 cases, city Health Department office manager Michael C. Lawler said in a press release.

The information on the upcoming clinics can also be found on the city webpage at http://www.cityofnewburyport.com/covid-19/covid-19-testing.

We are making critical coverage of the coronavirus available for free. Please consider subscribing so we can continue to bring you the latest news and information on this developing story.

See the article here:

Newburyport Health Dept. to offer COVID-19 testing clinics - The Daily News of Newburyport

Case Totals

As of 4:00 pm December 28, 2021 Dallas County Health and Human Services is reporting 1,619 additional positive cases of 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19) in Dallas County, 1,377 confirmed cases and 242 probable cases. There is a cumulative total of 358,807 confirmed cases (PCR test). There is a cumulative total of 66,889 probable cases (antigen test). A total of 5,488 Dallas County residents have lost their lives due to COVID-19 illness. Todays report includes data received on Thursday, December 23rd. Tomorrows reporting will include data from Friday the 24th through Tuesday the 28th.

Numbers are updated daily.Note: Does not include positive results from persons who reside out-of-state or outside of Dallas County.

Residents are asked to help prevent spread of the virus by practicing non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) such as social distancing (avoiding close contact with other people, especially those who are sick), covering coughs and sneezes, and hand hygiene. Clean and disinfect frequently touched surfaces, and avoid touching your eyes, nose and mouth with unwashed hands. If you are sick, stay home.

Current travel advisories can be viewed at the U.S. Department of State and CDC. The CDC recommends that travelers defer all cruise travel worldwide.

With the exception of the Summary Table of Cases, the below are only periodically updated.For weekday updates please visit the PCCI site here.

Dallas County Confirmed COVID-19 Cases by Zip CodeClick here to view and downloadthe Confirmed COVID-19 Cases by Zip Code map shown below.

Click here to view an interactive version of the Zip Code Map, updated daily.

This is exclusive for Dallas County. MyPCI is free to register and use. It is a secure, cloud-based tool that doesnt require personal health information and doesnt track an individuals mobile phone data. Instead, it is a sophisticated machine learning algorithm, geomapping and hot-spotting technology that uses daily updated data from the Department of Public Health on confirmed positive COVID-19 cases and the population density in a given neighborhood. Based on density and distances to those nearby who are infected, the MyPCI App generates a dynamic personal risk score.

We all know that proximity matters and its even more important now than ever while we work hard to get people vaccinated. Were very excited to put this information in the hands of Dallas county citizens so they have contextual awareness of whats happening around them and serve as a reminder of the things they can control: social distancing, face covering and hand hygiene.

Follow these steps to register and use - it's free!

High-Risk Individuals Are People That Meet Any One of the Following Criteria:

Click here to read the full guide.

Personas De Alto Riesgo Son Personas Que Cumplen Cualquiera De Los Siguientes Criterios:

Haga clic aqu para leer la gua completa.

Click here for information on how to apply.

COVID-19 Mental Health Resources are available for Dallas County Residents.

Continued here:

Dallas County Coronavirus (COVID-19) Updates and Information

Dallas County health officials have raised the COVID-19 threat level to red -- the highest on the county's scale -- due to a sharp increase in coronavirus cases and hospitalizations in the county, Judge Clay Jenkins says.

Jenkins said the county's public health committee made the recommendation Tuesday night.

A letter sent from the Public Health Committee to Judge Jenkins stated that "a dramatic increase in the number of COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and the hospital census in Dallas in the past week. We do also know that we have clusters of COVID-19 associated with social events, increased outbreaks in congregate settings and Dallas County is seeing a significant impact on the health care staffing and with pressure on emergency departments."

The letter continued, "At this point data from Dallas County demonstrate 1. A sustained increase in the % positivity among symptomatic and asymptomatic tested individuals (up to 40% in some healthcare settings); 2. An increase in emergency room visits for COVID-19 like illness, with over 25% of ED visits the last few days being for suspected COVID; 3. Increasing reports of inadequate testing facilities and access to testing (and testing kits) throughout the community (it appears that the healthcare facilities do have adequate supplies); 4. Increased reports of workforce and staffing challenges in acute care and long-term care facilities; 5. An increase in the hospital census, up to 333 as of 12/27, a 50% increase in the last week. 6. Rapidly rising COVID cases, with PCCI reporting a 76.3% week over week increase to 5541 through 12/23. 7. Elevated pediatric hospitalizations for COVID."

Full coverage of the COVID-19 outbreak and how it impacts you

The recommendations suggested by the health committee include: 1. Increasing the vaccination rates in Dallas County residents. We must get our population vaccinated and boosted to provide stronger protections against severe illness and hospitalization. 2. Enhancing testing capacity and access to testing to help our residents identify cases so that the affected can isolate and prevent further transmission. 3. Reinforcing and using tools available to them to implement universal masking and physical distancing in public areas. 4. Limiting the size of public gatherings to allow for physical distancing. 5. Encouraging the use of masking, physical distancing and vaccination together to combat this current variant.

See original here:

Dallas County Increases COVID-19 Threat Level to Red NBC ...

NORTH TEXAS (CBSDFW.COM) This is list of COVID-19 testing sites throughout North Texas as well as information on other useful resources. The list is sorted by county in alphabetical order, and each county has a search page of its own.

Collin County Covid Testing Sites: https://tdem.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=1e91fb79fa44417898738e5bff31a3d8

COVID Testing Location Resources: COVID-19 testing is available at local health centers, clinics and select pharmacies often at no-cost. Please always call ahead to verify availability, insurance coverage, or make an appointment as necessary.

Denton County Covid Testing Sites: https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/99c08bf4e29e46e2bdfac707e9bb9dc6

UPCOMING DENTON COUNTY PUBLIC HEALTH COVID-19 DRIVE-THRU TESTING SITES

The following are free drive thru testing clinics provided by DCPH. Please remain in your vehicle for the duration of your testing appointment. Principle Health Systems will administer a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test to detect for current COVID-19 infection. Appointments are required.

ELIGIBILITY

Eligibility for free COVID-19 testing through the DCPH partnership with Principle Health Systems includes individuals currently experiencing one or more COVID-19 symptom(s) OR a recent exposure to someone who has COVID-19. Individuals with a recent exposure should be tested no earlier than 5 days after their latest exposure.

TESTING PROCESS

A clinician will use a swab to collect a specimen from your nose. The specimen will then be sent to a laboratory. Patients can access their results online approximately 48 hours after testing.

If you have any questions, please call the DCPH COVID-19 Hotline Monday-Friday 8 AM 5 PM at 940-349-2585.

LOCATING OTHER TESTING SITES

Additional PCR and antigen testing sites can be found at local pharmacies, doctors offices, and additional testing centers. Please call or verify cost, availability, insurance coverage, and/or eligibility prior to seeking testing elsewhere.

Dallas County Covid Testing Sites: https://www.dallascounty.org/Assets/uploads/docs/covid-19/testing/Dec7-TestingLocationsUpdate-Website.pdf

Dallas College Drive-Thru Locations:

Mountain View Campus4849 W. Illinois Ave., Dallas, Texas 75211Ends Friday, December 24thOpen to all individuals experiencing symptomsMonday-Thursday, 7:30am 6pmFree, with or without insuranceNo appointment requiredDrive-thru testing

Richland Campus12800 Abrams Rd. Dallas, TX 75243Ends Friday, December 24thOpen to all individuals experiencing symptomsMonday-Thursday, 7:30am 6pmFree, with or without insuranceNo appointment requiredDrive-thru testing

Parkland

City of Dallas Mobile Testing

City of Dallas provides mobile testing to residents who do not have transportation means to get to a testing site. To be eligible for COVID-19 Mobile Testing, residents must:

Tarrant County Covid Testing Sites:

https://www.tarrantcounty.com/en/public-health/disease-controlprevention/COVID-19/covid-19-testing-in-tarrant-county.html

Testing Locations:

Beginning on Wednesday, Nov. 29 the following, TCPH contracted sites will begin operating seven days a week. They will be closed Saturday, Jan. 1, in observance of New Year Day.

Ben Thanh Market

1818 E Pioneer Parkway Ste., 100

Arlington, TX 76010

Monday to Friday: 9 a.m. to 7 p.m.,

Saturday and Sunday: 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Northeast Annex

837 Brown Trail

Bedford, TX 76022

Wednesday to Friday: 9 a.m. to 7 p.m.,

Saturday and Sunday: 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Resource Connection Parking LOT D

1500 Circle Drive

Fort Worth, TX 76119

Wednesday to Friday: 9 a.m. to 7 p.m.,

Saturday and Sunday: 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.

The following TCPH Brick and Mortar locations will also offer testing as per schedule posted here.

Arlington Adult Health Services

2596 E. Arkansas Lane

Arlington, TX 76014

Monday to Friday: 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Bagsby-Williams Public Health Clinic

3212 Miller Ave

Fort Worth, TX 76019

Monday to Friday: 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Northwest Public Health Center

3800 Adam Grubb Road

Lake Worth, TX 76135

Monday to Friday: 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Southwest Public Health Clinic

6551 Granbury Rd

Fort Worth, TX 76133

Monday to Friday: 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Watauga Public Health Center

6601 Watauga Road

Watauga TX 76148

Monday to Friday: 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

COVID-19 causes respiratory illness with cough, fever and shortness of breath and may lead to bronchitis and severe pneumonia. For more information CLICK HERE or call the Tarrant County Public Health information line, 817-248-6299, 8 a.m. 6 p.m., Monday Friday and Saturday 10 a.m. 2 p.m.

City of Fort Worth New Locations, Expanded Hours

The City of Fort Worth is making sure that access to COVID-19 testing remains available by opening new testing sites on Tuesdays and Thursdays at Fort Worth ISDs Scarborough-Handley Fieldhouse, as well as the Como Community Center. These sites are in addition to the current testing site at the TEXRail North Side Station, 3001 Decatur Ave.

These sites are all hosted by the City of Fort Worth and are open to everyone. The city is partnering with Vault Health. Saliva tests will be administered at no cost, with or without insurance, and appointments are not needed.

Here are the days and times for the Citys new locations:

Tuesdays

FWISD Scarborough-Handley Fieldhouse, 6201 Craig St., 8-11:30 a.m.

Como Community Center, 4660 Horne St., 1-4:30 p.m.

Thursdays

FWISD Scarborough-Handley Fieldhouse, 6201 Craig St., 8-11:30 a.m.

Como Community Center, 4660 Horne St., 1-4:30 p.m.

Go here to see the original:

Where To Get Tested For COVID-19 In North Texas CBS ...

A nurse closes a bag that contains a sample collected from a passenger as it's mandatory to check all arriving passengers to prevent the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), at the international airport in Phuket, Thailand November 29, 2021. REUTERS/Jorge Silva

Register

BANGKOK, Dec 29 (Reuters) - Thai health authorities warned on Wednesday that residents should brace themselves for a potential jump in coronavirus cases after classifying the country's first cluster of the Omicron variant as a super-spreader incident.

The Omicron cluster identified in the northeastern province of Kalasin on Christmas eve has been linked to a couple who had travelled from Belgium and visited bars, concerts and markets.

The ensuing cluster had infected hundreds, with cases spreading to 11 other provinces, said senior health official Opas Karnkawinpong, citing how one of the bars linked to the cluster had been packed and did not have good ventilation.

Register

"During the New Year, if you visit any place and it does not look safe, just don't go," Opas told a briefing.

Up to now, Thailand has reported 740 cases of the highly transmissible Omicron variant, including 251 in people who had come into contact with foreign arrivals, said Opas.

After coronavirus infections peaked in August above 20,000, daily case numbers have fallen to around 2,500 in the past week.

But the health ministry's planning scenario indicated that by March daily infections could hit 30,000, with more than 160 deaths, without a faster rollout of measures like vaccinations and testing, as well as greater social distancing.

If restrictions were tightened, daily cases could peak at 14,000 in February, with fewer than 60 daily deaths, the scenario showed.

In the first two weeks of January, government employees have been advised they can work from home, coronavirus taskforce spokesman Taweesin Wisanuyothin told a separate briefing, where he urged the private sector to follow suit.

After detecting the first local Omicron infection last week, Thai authorities reinstated mandatory quarantine for foreign arrivals and suspended a "Test & Go" programme that allowed vaccinated travellers to avoid quarantine.

Register

Reporting by Chayut SetboonsarngEditing by Ed Davies

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Excerpt from:

Thailand warns of spike in COVID-19 cases after "super-spreader" event - Reuters

A line forms at a walk-up COVID-19 testing site last week at Farragut Square, just blocks from the White House. Jacquelyn Martin/AP hide caption

A line forms at a walk-up COVID-19 testing site last week at Farragut Square, just blocks from the White House.

Washington, D.C., is experiencing a major pandemic surge making it the highest-risk place for COVID-19 infection in the nation.

D.C. experienced an average of 1,192 new cases per day over the past seven days, and 169 cases per 100,000 people as of Monday, according to data from the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University.

Despite relatively high vaccination rates, D.C. is experiencing a surge because of several factors, according to Dr. Neil J. Sehgal, an assistant professor of health policy and management at the University of Maryland School of Public Health.

"I suspect what we are seeing in D.C. is the collision of increased opportunity for transmission due to the demographics of the District, a missed policy opportunity to prevent transmission, and the transmission dynamics of omicron while vaccinated people are less likely to contract or transmit, with omicron, clearly both are happening," he told NPR.

Demographically, the D.C. area skews younger than the rest of the country; about 50% of residents of the District are between the ages of 20 and 49.

"Before vaccines were available, we learned that transmission in the United States was largely driven by adults 20 to 49 years of age," Sehgal said. "People age 20-49 are simply more transmission-efficient."

That's thanks to an increased likelihood of in-person work, a greater likelihood of household transmission due to raising young children and a greater chance of socializing outside the home, particularly during the holidays, he said.

Nardos Amare checks in people at a COVID-19 testing site outside Benning Stoddert Recreation Center last week in Washington, D.C. Alex Wong/Getty Images hide caption

Nardos Amare checks in people at a COVID-19 testing site outside Benning Stoddert Recreation Center last week in Washington, D.C.

Like many places across the country, the hunt for an at-home COVID-19 test in the District meant long lines. The city started distributing free test kits to residents prior to the holidays as COVID-19 case numbers reached new highs, alongside offering on-site testing.

The testing program, which includes daily distribution of rapid test kits at public libraries, stands out against surrounding areas where tests can be harder to come by.

D.C. COVID-19 public testing sites are set to be closed on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day, but the city will still be distributing test kits at select locations.

An indoor mask mandate would have helped cut down on transmission before it got so bad, Sehgal said. But the city dropped the requirement in November (it had a mask and social distancing advisory in place instead).

Sehgal said he and other health experts called on Mayor Muriel Bowser to bring the mandate back when cases began rising in the District just after Thanksgiving.

"We know now that omicron was circulating alongside delta at that time, and the reluctance to keep reasonable, science-based precautions in place seeded the transmission that we are seeing today," Sehgal said. "At that point we were on the 'flat' part of the exponential growth curve, but with every infected person passing the virus on to more than one other person on average, you can see how cases would continue to climb."

Now, the city has again cracked down on requirements for masks and vaccines. On Dec. 21, the city brought the mask mandate back through at least Jan. 31. At the time, Bowser said that she did not regret having dropped the mandate earlier and that "as conditions warranted, we've changed our interventions, and we are changing them again."

Starting Jan. 15, D.C. businesses including restaurants, bars, gyms, and music venues and certain meeting spaces will be required to ask patrons ages 12 and older for proof of vaccination to enter. When enforcement begins, patrons will only need to show proof of one shot to enter. By Feb. 15, two shots will be required for entry.

For the latest on the coronavirus in the D.C. area, follow member station WAMU's coverage here.

View post:

Washington, DC, is the worst place for COVID-19 infections right now - NPR

On the afternoon of New Years Eve, just hours from when 2019 was going to segue into 2020, I read an email about some unusual pneumonia cases in Chinas Hubei province. Over the past couple of decades, China has been a wellspring of dangerous zoonotic diseases SARS, H5N1 bird flu, and H7N9 bird flu. Better keep an eye on this, I thought to myself.

Fast-forward two years. Were entering the third year of the Covid-19 pandemic. So much has happened in the intervening months. Some things have gone surprisingly well, notably the rapid development of Covid vaccines and some therapeutics. But far more things have gone horribly wrong.Multiple commissions and panels have been set up to learn the lessons of this pandemic so that we dont repeat the same mistakes next time. (Yes, sadly, there will be a next time.) More commissions and panels are likely to follow. But already, some things have become abundantly clear.

Here are 10 lessons Ive learned in the past two years.

advertisement

You gotta act fastFor reasons I may never understand, in January and February of 2020 much of the world seemed not to grasp that the new virus that was spreading so rapidly in China wouldnt stay in China.

Some experts I spoke to early on thought that the new coronavirus would be controlled because two others in that family the SARS virus from 2003 and MERS, a camel virus that sometimes spreads to people didnt manage to ignite pandemics. But by late January, early February the virus had been found in a number of other countries. If the world ever truly had a chance to contain it, the moment had passed.

advertisement

The guiding principle of outbreak response is hope for the best but prepare for the worst. It has felt too often in this pandemic that people are forgetting about the second part of that maxim. Were seeing it even now with responses to the surging wave of Omicron cases.

It is true that public health authorities can get hammered if they sound the alarm for something that turns out not to merit it. The World Health Organization was pilloried by the European Parliament after the 2009 H1N1 flu pandemic ultimately proved not to be particularly deadly.

But with fast-developing disease outbreaks, if you wait until youre sure that something is going to be a disaster before seizing every opportunity to alter its trajectory, youve made the outbreak much, much worse.

Simplicity rules

In the summer and early autumn of 2020, when Phase 3 clinical trials of Covid vaccines were still underway, two groups in the United States set out to determine who should have first access when vaccine doses became available. The National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine established an expert panel that created a priority list. The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, an independent group that advises the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on vaccine policy, devised its own. Both groups prioritized health care workers and the elderly, who were at the highest risk of dying if they contracted the new virus. The schemes were not identical, but both emphasized that people with serious health conditions and essential workers people whose lives were at risk because they were doing jobs that kept society functioning should have early access to vaccine doses.

But who were essential workers? Does everyone who works in a hospital qualify as a health care worker? Could we realistically expect people administering the jabs to check whether the person before them actually had diabetes? Or that they taught elementary school, not spin classes? (In a word: No.)Though well-intentioned, the schemes were too complex to operationalize. A number of states junked them in favor of calling people forward by age strata, after theyd vaccinated health care workers.The same problem arose with the rollout of Covid boosters this fall, which happened in a stepwise fashion where eligibility was linked to age, health status, and the level of individual risk, because of where people lived or worked. Eventually Nirav Shah, president of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials, pleaded with ACIP to simplify the system, saying it was hampering booster shot uptake because people couldnt figure out whether they were eligible.

The calculus for kids is just different

One of the few blessings of this pandemic is that Covid-19 isnt nearly as hard on children as it is on adults, at least not in terms of illness and deaths. (It has been terrible for children in myriad other ways, particularly the disruption of in-person schooling and the educational and social consequences of that.) To date, there have only been 790 Covid deaths in children 18 years old and younger in the U.S., data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention suggest. Children and teens make up only 0.1% of the more than 800,000 deaths the country has incurred.

Covid has been seen to induce a post-infection condition in some children called MIS-C short for multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children. According to the CDC, there have been nearly 6,000 reported cases in the U.S. Most children who develop MIS-C recover, but there have been 52 deaths.

In the main, though, children experience milder disease when they catch Covid. And because of their far lower risk of death, the WHO has suggested children should be vaccinated later, after health workers and older adults the world over have been protected.

Logically, the WHO is correct. Prioritizing vaccine doses for older adults would save more lives. But the agencys pleas have fallen on deaf ears.

Societies may accept large numbers of deaths in the elderly, but even small numbers of deaths in children are deemed to be too many. There was never a meaningful debate in this country about the ethics of vaccinating American kids before vaccinating African health workers. There were no public proponents arguing for putting kids here behind adults elsewhere.

Even in the face of a deadly pandemic, politics override public health

Call me naive, but it never occurred to me before this pandemic that political leaders would put the lives of their citizens at risk by downplaying or downright lying about a disease outbreak, just because telling the truth might jeopardize their political fortunes.

It never dawned on me that political leaders would oppose policies designed to save the lives of their citizenry and mitigate the personal and economic damage an outbreak was causing things like rules about wearing masks or getting vaccinated.

If that thought had occurred to me, I would have assumed such leaders would have been punished by their followers when it became clear a path taken for political expediency was costing tens of thousands of lives. I wouldnt have dreamed that instead, those same followers would embrace the bad advice and reject public health guidance.

I didnt anticipate the havoc polarized politics would wreak on a pandemic response. I thought everyone would have the same goal: Keep as many people from dying as possible.But so much of the U.S. response has broken down along political lines. Uptake of vaccine is higher in blue counties than it is in red. Mask mandate opposition is higher in parts of the country that vote Republican. The virus doesnt vote and it doesnt care how we do. Its only looking for respiratory tracts to infect. I assumed wed all understand that.

Most people have no clue how science works. And thats a problemScience education in this and a number of countries is woefully inadequate. As a result, people do not understand the iterative nature of science. With a brand new pathogen, it takes time to figure out things like how infectious it is or the means by which it best spreads. When vaccines are developed and first put into use, it takes time to see how well theyll work and for how long theyll protect. Some vaccines protect for years, others only months. (Im thinking about flu vaccine here.) The only way to determine where Covid vaccines fall on the spectrum is to give them and watch for breakthrough infections to start to occur. Theres no way around this, but people have found it frustrating.

We saw the lack of understanding of how science works in calls from some quarters to use prototype vaccines before theyd even been tested for safety and efficacy. (The risks would have been huge, and such a move would have been ethically indefensible.) We saw it repeatedly when new knowledge was acquired and WHO or CDC guidance was updated accordingly. Instead of recognizing changes as a reflection that more had been learned about the virus, many people seemed to feel theyd been deliberately misled by the earlier advice. At a time when there is so little trust in public figures and institutions, this lack of understanding contributed to the erosion of confidence in agencies and authorities leading the pandemic response and further undermined support for the Covid control measures they recommended.

Downplaying what lies ahead helps no one

In early 2020, country after country followed Chinas lead and instituted some form of lockdown to try to slow spread of a virus that was rapidly overwhelming hospitals wherever it went. When then-President Trump followed suit on March 16, he announced that if people stayed home for 15 days, that would be enough to slow the virus spread. Trump spoke of a return to normal by Easter, which fell on April 4.

There was no talk about the fact that the need to reduce transmission of the virus wasnt a one-time thing that there was nothing miraculous about a 15-day pause. If people returned to life as normal immediately thereafter, the gains of the pause would quickly evaporate.

Which is exactly what happened. People thought theyd done their bit, taken their lumps only to find out much more sacrifice lay ahead.

Winning the vaccine race really does matter. So does experiencePfizer and BioNTech were the first of the Western pharmaceutical companies to prove they had produced an efficacious Covid-19 vaccine. The Food and Drug Administration granted it an emergency use authorization on Dec. 11, 2020 11 months after the genetic code for the SARS-2 virus was shared with the world.Hot on their heels was Moderna, a brash Cambridge, Mass.-based biotech, with an equally efficacious vaccine that was made the same way, using messenger RNA. The FDA granted it an EUA one week later, on Dec. 18.No one has ever accused the leadership of Moderna of being shrinking violets. But Pfizer has been speedier and, well, pushier in the vaccine development race, consistently beating competitors to become the first and in the U.S., still the only vaccine that is fully licensed.

The Pfizer vaccine is the only vaccine in this country that can be used in teens under the age of 18. It is the first to be authorized for use in children; it is now available for kids aged 5 and up. It was the first to be granted an EUA for a booster shot. Its currently the only vaccine recommended as a booster for people who were vaccinated outside the U.S. with a vaccine not authorized for use here (in other words, a vaccine like the AstraZeneca jab) or for people who took part in U.S. trials of vaccines that havent been authorized here (AstraZeneca, Novavax).

By dint of its many firsts and its eye-popping initial vaccine efficacy, Pfizer has created the perception that it is the premier Covid vaccine, even though Modernas vaccine, which uses three times the antigen contained in the Pfizers shot, may in the end be the better vaccine.But Pfizers success is not just about being first. The company has a deep well of experience in commercial-scale production and in navigating regulatory processes something Moderna, which had never commercialized a product before, did not. The differences in regulatory experience may explain why Pfizer was awarded a full license for its vaccine 3.5 months after initiating its application for one. Moderna, on the other hand, took 2.8 months just to complete its application for a full license; four months later, it is still waiting for the license.

Being first on its own might not have positioned Pfizer to be the dominant vaccine provider of the pandemic; by all practical measures, Moderna tied with the Pfizer vaccine getting across the initial finish line. And the vaccines were virtually identical in efficacy outcomes 95% (Pfizer) and 94% (Moderna) against symptomatic Covid infections. But being first and having the know-how to turn a good prototype into massive amounts of vaccine while at the same time successfully navigating regulatory processes has been a winning combination for the Pfizer-BioNTech partnership.

In a pandemic, its pretty much every country for itself

I hate that this is true. But I fear that it is.

The world has suffered from the fact that we are not working together to try to end the pandemic. Rich countries buying up most of the available vaccines, pharmaceutical companies refusing to share vaccine formulas and production know-how, countries blocking exports of oxygen and personal protective equipment all this has drawn out the pandemic and made it more difficult to endure. Its no surprise that vaccine nationalism has reigned, or that borders have closed, often on scientifically indefensible grounds. (See: The Biden administrations month-long ban on travel from eight southern African countries, even though the Omicron variant is already the dominant virus in this country.) Next time, it will be worse. Borders will close more quickly, keeping people out and critical matriel in, because countries will know what lies ahead.

Its ugly and its counterproductive but it may be inevitable. I would like to be wrong on this.

Conducting clinical trials during a pandemic is doable, but it takes coordination

It is enormously challenging to plan and conduct clinical trials during a disease crisis especially trials large enough to come to a solid conclusion about whether the drug or vaccine being tested actually works. Time and again, trials conducted during previous outbreaks were too small, were conducted without a control arm (i.e. the thing being tested wasnt compared to a placebo), or were still struggling to reach an answer when the outbreak ended.This time has been different. Sort of.In a true story fit for the big screen, Sir Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust, and British scientist Martin Landray mapped out a plan for what has proven to be an enormously successful trial of Covid treatments while riding a London bus.

The Recovery trial, as it came to be called, told the world the steroid dexamethasone improved survival in people seriously ill with Covid. It proved two HIV drugs, lopinavir and ritonavir, didnt change Covid outcomes. It also showed that hydroxychloroquine, an antimalarial drug, was ineffective against the new virus.

Recovery harnessed the power of the United Kingdoms single-payer health care delivery system, the NHS, to enroll sufficient numbers of Covid patients in the early days of the pandemic to come up with much needed answers rapidly. In a separate endeavor, the WHOs Solidarity trial arrived at some needed answers by drawing in data from around the world.

In the U.S., Operation Warp Speed helped design and run some clinical trials that quickly tested the efficacy of Covid vaccines it helped to fund.But when it came to testing existing drugs to see if they could be repurposed for Covid, much of the U.S. effort was a bust. Scores and scores to too-small studies came to inconclusive results. Lack of coordination meant that trials continued to study whether hydroxychloroquine acted against Covid even after there was a wealth of evidence that it did not.

Americans are willing to put up with a lot of deathThe official Covid death toll in the United States is nearing 820,000, a figure that is certainly an underestimate, though by how much remains unclear. A truly stunning fact about those deaths is that more of them occurred in 2021 than in 2020. Covid vaccine doses were in short supply in the first quarter of 2021, but soon thereafter anyone who wanted to be vaccinated could get jabbed. And this fall, anyone 16 years and older who wanted to get boosted could get a third shot.

And still, more people died from Covid in 2021 than died from Covid in 2020. In 2021, swaths of the country fought mask mandates, opposed vaccination mandates, objected to any measure designed to slow the spread of Covid that they perceived as an impediment on their ability to resume pre-pandemic activities. This insistence on returning to life as normal came at an unfathomable cost the loss of hundreds of thousands of parents, grandparents, great-grandparents. Aunts and great-aunts, uncles, and great uncles. Cousins. Friends. Coworkers and supervisors. And still, big chunks of the population refused to get vaccinated, refused to wear masks, insisted SARS-2 was a hoax, or was no more threatening than the flu. It almost is inexplicable, Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told me when I asked him about this last month.

For me, it is incomprehensible.

See more here:

10 lessons I've learned from the Covid19 pandemic - STAT

COVID-19: A look at the most startling pandemic numbers from 2021

From vaccinations to variants, here are some of the most shocking pandemic stats from 2021.

Staff video, USA TODAY

Iowa is among a group of about a dozenstates that tookaction in 2021 to ban employer mandates or require exemptions for the COVID-19 vaccine.

Republicans, who control both chambers of the Iowa Legislature, have indicated that a push for more legislation to push back against potential coronavirus vaccine requirements is likely.But Republican leadersdon't appear as eager to revisit other requirements, such as immunizationrequirements for students.

Some groups in Iowa thatare pushing back against COVID-19 vaccinerequirements have also pushed for broader exemptions for childhood vaccinationsand gathering more information on childhood vaccines.

Across the U.S., Republicans are likely to take more steps to oppose mandates while Democrats could try to strengthen vaccine requirements. Some national political observerssay they don't expect to see it translateintoa significant push to alter other vaccination requirements like childhood immunization rules.

"I don't expect itto spill over into childhood immunizations and vaccinations for school," said Tim Storey, CEO of the National Conference of State Legislatures.

For subscribers: Learn more about what Iowa Republicans plan to do with COVID-19 mandates in this subscriber-only story.

State Rep. Bobby Kaufmann, R-Wilton, who chairs the House State Government Committee, said he's looking to keep thefocus on vaccine mandates narrow.

"I've not had a single human being approachme otherwise," Kaufmann said.

And Informed Choice Iowa vice president Brei Johnson, who has helped lead the fight against COVID-19 vaccine mandates,also said she sees COVID-19 vaccine mandates as the morepressing issue.

"I feel like people first need to be alleviated (of) that," she said."You know, secure their job, keep their job, apply for a jobwithout the medical discrimination that we're seeinghappening, and exposure to their personal health information."

More: A year after the first COVID shot, nearly 1.8M Iowans are fully vaccinated. But more work remains to end the pandemic

That doesn't mean legislation couldn't appear like it has in years past.Senate Majority Leader Jack Whitver, R-Ankeny, didnt rule out additional proposals. However, healso didn't indicate it is a high priority for Senate Republicans.

I would say that the COVID vaccine ... shined a light on all the vaccine policy,Whitvertold the Des Moines Registerin mid-December. We'll certainlytake a look at that as people file different bills. But I don't have a billin particular thatI'm looking at."

Ian Richardson covers the Iowa Statehouse for the Des Moines Register. Reach him at irichardson@registermedia.com, at 515-284-8254, or on Twitter at @DMRIanR.

View original post here:

Iowa Republicans are pushing back against COVID-19 vaccine mandates. Will they take on the measles too? - Des Moines Register

Bradley Beal has been one of the few and most notable NBA players to resist getting the COVID-19 vaccine shot(s). Until recently, other than Beal being subject to stricter NBA protocols, that hadn't been an issue in Washington D.C., where there were previously no vaccine mandates.

That will not be the case for much longer.

Amid the latest COVID-19 surge, Washington D.C. has mandated a citywide vaccine requirement for indoor entertainment facilities, which includes Capital One Arena, where the Wizards play.

Please check the opt-in box to acknowledge that you would like to subscribe.

Sorry! There was an error processing your subscription.

The mandate, which will require all patrons aged 12 or older who enter these facilities to have had at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, will take effect on Jan. 15, 2022.

That means Beal, like Kyrie Irving in New York, wouldn't have been permitted to play or even enter the building for home games had he chosen to remain unvaccinated. Fortunately for the Wizards, Beal has reportedly flipped his stance and received his first dose of the vaccine, per Ava Wallace of the Washington Post.

Beal entered the league's COVID health and safety protocols on December 23, but it is not clear whether he actually contracted the virus or was merely exposed, which is enough to land unvaccinated players in protocols.

There is no indication when Beal actually received his first dose of the vaccine.

See the original post:

Bradley Beal reportedly receives first dose of COVID-19 vaccine, keeping him clear of Washington D.C. mandate - CBS Sports